The Quest Group - LGBT

Mission: Providing safety, support, and encouragement for individuals living the Unity principles as gay men and lesbian women. We are a Spiritual, Support, and Social Group.

Vision Statement: The Quest Group is a supportive, loving, spiritual community for gays, lesbians, and those who love and support them. This community of unconditional acceptance provides opportunities to know each other through God and to know God through each other.

Quest meets on the 2nd and 4th Friday of every month. Our first meeting of the month is at 7:00 pm and our second meeting begins with a potluck dinner at 6:30. We meet at Unity Church - Fellowship Hall. Contact Kathleen or Laury at UnityQuest@comcast.net for more information.

Unity Church and the Quest group offer the LGBT community a diverse non-traditional church that is accepting of all people.

How Quest began: The Quest Group at Unity Church of Harrisburg has been in existence since 2000; it is the longest running most active group at Unity. It was started so that LGBT members of Unity would have a place to grow spiritually in a supportive environment. Our minister at the time recognized a need to start a group to support the gay, lesbian, bi-sexual and transgendered members of the church. The original name was the "Alternative Lifestyles Support Group". The intent of the group was to foster the spiritual growth of the members and to do social activities together. After completing the book titled The Quest: A Spiritual Journey of Rediscovery, (in 2002) we renamed the Group "Quest".

Currently the group is facilitated by Kathleen Swain and Laury McIntyre as co-leaders of the Quest Group. The Quest group's bi-monthly meetings primarily focus on spiritual growth through book study (books are suggested by members). We also have monthly pot luck dinners, have workshops, and go on 'field trips.' Other Quest activities include having booths at Central Pennsylvania's annual Gay Pride Festival and at the Central Pennsylvania Women's Music Festival. As a group, we built Unity's Labyrinth and Peace Garden behind the church. We started the Labyrinth Cafe in 2007. We have had several coffee houses and brunches and have brought in musical artists, many from the LGBT community. We occasionally have workshops on topical issues that are open to the Church congregation and the community at large.

Part of our ground rules: Some thoughts when concern arises as to whether you have anything to add to the group, from Gary Zukav's "Seat of the Soul", "Who among us is an expert on the human experience? We have only the gift of sharing perceptions that hopefully can help those on their journey. There is no such thing as an expert on the human experience. The human experience is an experience in movement and thought and form, and, in some cases, an experiment in movement and thought and form. The most that we can do is comment on the movement, the thought and the form, but those comments are of great value if they can help people to learn to move gracefully, to think clearly, to form - like artists - the matter of their lives."